


greedy hearts

by thesilverwitch (orphan_account)



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, M/M, Metaphors, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-20
Updated: 2012-06-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 15:17:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2816873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/thesilverwitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, when you’re young and careless and trouble seems to be miles away from you, your heat gets eaten. AU where Louis doesn't have a heart and Harry doesn't care.</p>
            </blockquote>





	greedy hearts

**Author's Note:**

> This is a repost of a fic I wrote ages ago and originally posted on LJ. Posting it here since I'm still fond of it to this day.
> 
> The AU is based on the idea that people can give their hearts (in a soul-mate magic kind of way) to their soul mates, only sometimes they offer them recklessly to the wrong people and their hearts get eaten. Thanks for reading x

Sometimes, when a person is young, careless and trouble seems to be miles away from them, their hearts are eaten.

Devoured, mangled, chewed incessantly—all the words fit and yet, none truly do. Eaten is the correct expression.

Their hearts are eaten by a greedy person who craves for the sweet taste of their innocence. It will pang the person who lost their heart tremendously. They loved the person who ate their heat so much. This person, who is also young and careless and who wasn’t able to resist the temptation of a blissful heart from someone they didn’t love.

An eaten heart is neither the first, nor will it be the last in the world. It happens more often than people would like to admit, although most of the time people pretend it’s something that doesn’t happen. On the rare chances that it does, it happens to people they’ve never met. Still, the truth is that it does happen and since the moment one is born, others warn them about the danger.

‘Hearts get eaten and they can’t be replaced. Be careful. Don’t go off giving your heart to the first pretty face you see.’

But not everyone listens to that advice. Sometimes people like him, young, careless and most of all, stupidly in love, trust the first pretty face they see. Before they know it, the other person has their heart in their hands and their pretty faces eat it without a second thought.

Then the person without a heart will stand there in silence as their chest burns with fire, unable to do anything but watch as their heart disappeared into the greedy body of someone they thought they loved.

When they finish eating the heart and look at them with blood-dazed eyes, the now heartless person becomes nothing and the other walks away scot free.

* * *

 

“You know, people make it sound much worse than it is," Liam says for what has to be the hundredth time.

Louis doesn’t bother replying. Neither of the boys has a heart. Unlike Liam, however, who, despite all evidence proving the contrary, remains hopeful that one day he’ll find someone who will care enough to fix him, Louis has already given up. Not having a heart is really, nothing special like Liam said, it’s just hollow and hopeless.

The pain in your chest fades away with time until it’s nothing but a dull sort of ache that can be ignored. There’s prejudice, sure, but nowadays there’s prejudice everywhere and Louis never did care about the looks strangers gave him on the street, much less their brainless opinions. He’ll never be able to love again, but humanity is a dark, foul thing and Louis reckons he’s better off alone anyway.

Well, actually, that last part is sort of a lie.

Louis and Liam can love. They can love, worship and desire as strongly as anyone with a heart can, but unlike those people, they can’t be in a lasting relationship for their lack of hearts makes them extremely undesirable.

It’s costume behavior to offer your heart to your one true love when you find them, and in return they’ll offer you theirs. With your lover’s heart in your chest you will know all about their secrets, their flaws and their strengths, and you will love them unconditionally.

Many have tried to describe the feeling of completion one experiences when they trade hearts, although few have succeeded. The closest they’ve ever gotten was ‘eternally blissful happiness’.

Only sometimes, when you offer your heart recklessly and the person you give it to doesn’t feel the same way, they will eat your heart.

Scientists call it ‘heart fever’, the uncontrollable need to devour hearts. They say the first years of humanity were blood-filled ones, where people would fight to their deaths for hearts, trying to get them in whatever ways they could, and that trading hearts was probably invented by someone as a survival technique.

The person you offer your heart to will enter in a trance and they’ll only be able to see, hear, smell, and feel your heart until it’s theirs. Normally, this is where the survival technique would kick in. They’d calmly take it as they offered you theirs, but since there isn’t a real bond between you, they’ll just take it without a second thought.

The hype of it is maddening, to some it can even become addicting and they’ll live the rest of their lives with the sole desire of obtaining more hearts. To most though, it’s a miserable experience and afterwards they will regret their actions immensely only by then it will be too late, and their lovers will be gone.

There is only one known way to mend a person with a broken heart. Give them half of yours. Together you’ll both live the rest of your lives in halves, feeling like there’s something missing and knowing you’ll never get it back. Still, half a heart is always better than no heart at all, except for the part where nobody wants to give away part of them without getting anything in return. Thus, people like Liam and Louis are ignored by a better half of society, bound to be alone forever.

Liam looks at Louis out of the corner of his eye with that sad, puppy-eyed look he always gets when Louis is particularly more cynical and depressing than usual.

They’re in Louis’ apartment watching the game. Liam had suggested going to a bar, but more often than not bartenders kick them out before they even place their drinks, yelling about on they didn’t want mutts like them in their establishments. Normally, Louis doesn’t give a fuck about ignorant slobs like those and simply tries to find another bar. Normally, Louis doesn’t give a fuck about an awful lot of things, but tonight he’s not feeling his usual-self. Tonight, all he wants is to watch the game, drink a couple of beers with his best mate somewhere they can’t get harassed and—for a couple of hours—pretend his life isn’t shit.

* * *

 

The place Louis works in is a coffee shop. It’s a small venue beneath a vintage clothing shop in a neighborhood Louis often defines as ‘hipster land’. He likes his job because even though it’s taking him nowhere life, he appreciates its simplicity.

Greeting people, pouring coffee, picking muffins and smiling until his cheeks hurt. There isn’t much to it. Everything’s easy and everything’s quick to do. People come and go in less than five minutes, always busy thinking about their own jobs and their lives, never giving Louis a second glance, which is quite good for Louis since the last thing he wants is some asshole yelling at him because of who he is.

Liam says it’s rubbish. That he shouldn’t have to hide like that, that there are better things out there for someone as smart and funny as him and that Louis is wasting his life by contenting himself with a stupid job in a stupid coffee shop until they fire him. Liam says a lot of things with enough conviction to tower down whole cities. Louis thinks he’d make a fine preacher, or maybe a motivational speaker.

On Mondays work starts at eight a.m and bless employee’s discount on all coffee composed items, since he doesn’t think he’d make it without a large mug of coffee every morning.

He’s on his third cup when a boy around his age, with a ridiculous amount of curls on his head, enters the shop. He’s wearing a polo jacket and obscenely tight white jeans, which means he’s probably part of the hipster movement Louis will never understand. Unlike all the others who stop by every day, drink coffee and smoke handmade cigarettes in clothes that look like they’ve never been washed, the kid looks good.

Louis isn’t one for compliments, mostly because he never gets to use them and he doesn’t see the point, but if he had to apply one word to the boy in front of him, he’d go with beautiful, or maybe hotsauce. Either is appropriate, all things taken into account.

The boys goes up to the counter and smiles at Louis and nope, scratch that about ‘beautiful’, he’s more like a wingless angel, or maybe some kind of land merman. Louis never did like settling for just one word when he had more at his disposal.

The boy’s eyes crinkle around the corners and huge dimples spread on his cheeks. For the tiniest second, Louis wonders what it would be like to kiss them.

The next second he crushes all of his stupid hopes, dreams and delusional fantasies because the boy in front of him obviously has a heart and wow, look at something that is never going to happen.

Even if Louis had a heart, which he doesn’t and will never have again, he’d still be Louis. A guy who works in a coffee shop six days a week to pay the rent of his craptastic apartment, only has two friends and didn’t even graduate from college while pretty boy would be… well he’d still be pretty for starters, and probably amazing and intelligent and completely out of Louis’ league in every possible way.

“Hello, what can I get you?” Louis asks. He wills himself into not noticing how pretty boy’s smile widened when Louis spoke.

“A large mocha coffee and chocolate chip cookie,” the boy continues smiling while Louis grabs his cookie and checks the register. Louis wonders if maybe his cheeks are broken.

“That will be 4.35. What’s your name?” he asks.

Louis will never understand why he needs to ask for the customer’s names every time they order a drink. The biggest queue he ever saw was of five people and most of their customers are regulars already. He’s pretty sure the manager is just trying to imitate Starbucks, but whatever. Who’s he to question orders from Simon, the mighty store manager? A name, by the way, that he genuinely calls himself when he thinks no one’s paying him any attention.

“Harry,” the boy says. Louis rolls the name around his tongue after telling pretty boy he can sit. Harry. Harryyy. It’s a nice name, as far as names go, effortless and young. It fits the boy, who somehow manages to exude light confidence without even trying.

When Louis stops by pretty boy’s—Harry’s—table, Harry’s got a laptop out and has managed to spread enough paper sheets around him to cover his whole table, a fraction of the one next to it and all of the adjoining seats. Also, he’s still smiling.

“Your mocha coffee.”

“Thanks,” Harry grabs the cup and sort of nuzzles his cheek on it, which would be really creepy by Louis didn’t do the same thing every morning. Coffee does things to people.

Louis is already walking back towards the counter when Harry asks, “hey, is it cool if take this table too?”

“Huh? Oh yeah, it’s fine,” Harry’s smile somehow manages to broaden, and Louis doesn’t even know how that’s physically possible.

For the rest of the day customers come and go, all except Harry, who writes on his laptop almost incessantly and only takes breaks for more coffee and to pee. Louis watches him out of the corner of his eye whenever traffic in the shop is slow, and he’s not interested in Harry, seriously he’s not delusional or anything. He’s just curious. Today is the first time he’s ever seen the boy and yet he already walks around the coffee shop as if he owns the place.

By four p.m. when Harry is at the register for his fifth? Or maybe sixth? Cup of coffee, Louis pits a ham and cheese sandwich on his hands. Harry raises a single eyebrow even as he takes more money out of his wallet. “You haven’t eaten anything except for that cookie six hours ago," Louis explains with a shrug and there’s that bloody smile again. Louis is pretty positive by this point that every time Harry smiles, he somehow manages to make it bigger and brighter than his last.

“Thanks,” he says. Louis shrugs again, as if paying close attention for his customers’ health is actually pretty normal for him.

Harry stays until the shops closes. Louis is the one closing and locking up, offering his coworker Eleanor the chance to go home early to her family. His good action wins him a soft kiss on the cheek, and Louis giggles like the schoolgirl and pretends to blush because that always makes El laugh too.

Louis really likes Eleanor, she’s gorgeous and even though she has a heart, she doesn’t treat him with any sort of disgust. She’s a nice change from the guy Louis worked with before, who stole money from the register and also happened to be a total asshole.

Cleaning all the tables that and throwing paper napkins into the trashcan, Louis makes his way towards Harry slowly, silently hoping Harry will notice he has to leave before Louis reaches him so Louis can avoid seeing that heartbreaking smile again. Harry doesn’t notice.

“Hey, don’t wanna be rude but we’re kind of closing so…” Louis trails off as he looks at Harry expectantly.

“What?” Harry asks as he takes a brief look around and notices he and Louis are the only ones left in the store. “Shit, I lost track of time, sorry.”

Harry begins packing with much more haste than he needs to and Louis briefly considers telling him there’s no marathon waiting from him outside, but then decides against it since Harry isn’t a friend and Louis doesn’t have a heart and a friendship between them is just something that is not going to happen any time soon.

Also, chances are Louis theory about Harry’s broken cheeks is correct, and it really is physically impossible for Harry to stop smiling. Yeah, definitely. No one with a heart and in their right minds would be so nice to a person without a heart. Louis knows this from personal experience, he’s friends with Niall after all.

In the midst of shoving a thousand papers in one tiny messenger bag, Harry knocks his cup of coffee to the ground, spilling half of its contents all over Louis’ shoes.

“Oh shit I’m so, so sorry," Harry squeaks as he desperately searches for something to clean Louis’ shoes with. Louis sees him glance down at his shirt as he if he’s actually considering using it and even though Louis doesn’t laugh much, especially not in front of virtual strangers, he has to laugh at that.

“It’s alright Harry, it’s fine. My shoes were already ruined. You should see my mate Niall, I swear his fingers are made of butter," And at least Harry has the decency to look apologetic, unlike Liam who always shrugs it off, promises Louis he’ll buy him a new thing of whatever he’s just ruined and then never does.

For what has to be the hundredth time that day, Harry gives Louis a smile capable of lighting up whole cities. “I’ll make it up to you,” a pause to look at the nametag on Louis’ shirt, “Louis," Harry says before he smiles, yet again and dashes off.

It’s only as Louis goes home that a second theory on Harry’s never-ending smiles occurs to him: drugs.

* * *

 

Harry’s not on drugs or maybe he is, and he’s just doing a hell of a job looking clean. Still, Louis reckons he isn’t. Harry might not be on the list of ‘top prime citizens’, but from the amount of paperwork he keeps bringing, Louis deduces that he goes to the music college a couple of blocks away. Considering the stories Louis has heard about that place, it would actually be weirder if Harry looked normal and not like he hasn’t slept in a week.

Harry stops by every day, sometimes he stays until the shop closes, other times he leaves around lunch. He always takes the same table, always takes out his laptop and writes so much, Louis wouldn’t be surprised if he had callous on his fingers. And he always smiles, whenever he goes up at the register or sees Louis looking at him, just this big, white smile threatening to break his face.

It’s excused to say Louis doesn’t get him. He mulls Harry over, looks at him from all points of view, tries his goddamn hardest to just understand the mysterious creature in front of him and fails, quite badly, every time. Louis hasn’t had a heart in a long, long time, only has a couple of childhood memories from the times he was still happy and carefree and the thing about not having a heart is that whether you want to or not, you see the world for what it is.

Some people, like Liam, try to close their eyes, shove their fingers in their ears and sing as loud as they can ‘NANANANANA’ just so they don’t have to face the truth. But Louis doesn’t that, believes lying to himself is pointless. So he knows how shitty life is. He knows society thinks of him as less worthy—less human—than people with hearts and he knows it’s impossible to run from that type of prejudice.

When you don’t have a heart, you’re empty. There’s a gap in your chest where hope and love once lived, and where you can only find darkness now.

It’s like losing a member than you can’t see, that you barely even appreciate when you have it, but when its lost its like your whole world collapses and you can’t breathe, you can’t see, you can’t feel.

Everybody knows this, and even though there are people like Eleanor and Niall who don’t care, who feel like nobody is worth more than anyone else because of their hearts, they still don’t want to be with someone with missing a heart. There’s still this tiny ounce of fear in them, an instinct of survival and preservation for what you have because some say losing half of your heart is worse than losing it whole.

And there’s this possibility, this really tiny possibility that Harry is like Niall and Eleanor and just wants to be friends with Louis, which would be fine, Louis wouldn’t want to of course since he already has enough people in his life, but it wouldn’t be the first time someone saw Louis and thought of him as a friendship charity case and ultimately, it would be fine. But Harry’s smiles are more than that. The way he leans his body every time he goes to the register, the way he licks his lips when he sneaks Louis a glance, the way he just acts—flaunting himself with an easy confidence Louis can only fake is not fine.

So Louis is confused, but since confronting Harry is not on his ‘to do’ list, he keeps his mouth shut and acts like everything’s cool.

They chit-chat, just Harry casually asking him how’s it going and Louis questioning him about the mountain of papers on his table. He tells himself it’s part of his job to be nice to customers, that he’s not interested in Harry, that he’s just interested in whatever Harry is getting at and that the way Harry acts is probably because hasn’t slept in forever and he’s stopped noticing who has and doesn’t have a heart.

It’s a shitty theory, even shittier than the one about Harry having broken cheeks, but Louis has always found denial to be more satisfying than facing the truth.

By the end of the week, chit-chatting and smiling is all they’ve done.

Louis begins to believe maybe he’d been wrong in his judgment, maybe Harry is really just being friendly for the sake of being friendly or maybe he’s afraid Louis will mess up his coffee if he’s rude or maybe he really wants to be friends or maybe it’s something else entirely that is also completely fine as long as it doesn’t include Harry being interested in Louis as more than friends.

It wouldn’t be the first time he got something like this wrong. Definitely would not be the first time where he made decisions and reached conclusions way to quickly for his own good.

And then it’s Friday, and once again Harry’s stayed until closing time. Louis is cleaning the tables, singing under his breath something he heard on the radio earlier and Harry isn’t working anymore, he’s just sitting there and smiling. All dimples and more cuteness than anyone older than five should have.

“You’re closing?” Harry asks even though he already knows his answer.

“Yupe, so you should probably start packing your stuff," Louis replies, offering Harry a smile so he doesn’t sound as rude as his words play him out to be.

Harry nods, but doesn’t move, continues sitting there and smiling until Louis has reached his table.

“What are you doing after work?” Harry asks.

“Huh?”

“Today, what are you doing? Because I know this great restaurant and if you’re interested we could…” Harry keeps talking, ranting on and on about this amazing restaurant he knows and would love to take Louis to but Louis isn’t listening anymore.

He’s just frozen by the table, a piece of cloth in his hand and as he gaps at nothing and wonders what kind of sick joke Harry is playing at because Louis might have allowed himself to dream about the possibility of Harry asking him out when he was too tired to keep coming up with bullshit explanations, but that’s all it ever was. A dream. An idea that was never going to happen. It was just Louis’ brain running wild and dreaming of a world where things were a bit fairer.

It’s just… it’s mean. It’s sick, and heartbreaking and cruel, and Harry seemed like such a nice guy so Louis has literally no idea why he’s doing this to him because Louis doesn’t have a heart. It’s a fact, something that he knows with every inch of his body and something the stupid boy in front of him is painfully mocking. He can’t be loved by anyone. Not his family, not his friends, not a stupid stranger with a mop for hair and a smile that makes no sense and Louis knows this, he knows how unwanted he is too damn well so why is Harry even bothering baffles the fuck out of him.

“Get out," He says, voice cold and devoid of any emotion.

“I—what?” Harry asks, eyes wide open in shock and a tiny bit of fear as Louis clenches his fists and tries his hardest not to punch Harry.

“Get. The. Fuck. Out. I’m not here to play games with you or be your fucking charity case or whatever sick idea you might be thinking of," He turns around and heads for the first door he sees so he doesn’t have to see Harry anymore. As much as Louis would love to leave in a big dramatic gesture that always seems deeply gratifying in movies, he can’t just leave the shop.

Harry shouts his name and Louis thinks he deserves an Oscar for the way he sounds like he actually cares.

* * *

“You’re an idiot.”

“I’m not—“

“You totally are mate, sorry, but it’s true," Niall adds around a mouthful of pizza and Louis melts himself further into the couch.

“He was trying to prank me or something.”

“He was trying to be nice!” Liam says as his grip on the remote control tightens. “And you just assumed the worst, like you always do, and ruined a perfectly good relationship.”

“It wasn’t a good relationship Liam, I barely even know him.”

“Yeah, but you still went on and on about him all week," Niall adds with a crunched face, like hearing about Harry through Louis was some sort of torture. Louis hadn’t even talked about Harry that much. He’d just recapitulated every conversation they had.

“He has a heart. I don’t," Louis says, decided on not losing this fight even though things aren’t looking very good for him.

After storming out on Harry, Louis had hid himself in the tiny toilet until he heard Harry leave and his anger simmered down to plain, old embarrassment. He texted the boys immediately, telling them he desperately needed a night to help him forget the world. Unfortunately, his plan turned against him when Liam somehow convinced him that staying in and talking about what happened was a better idea than going out clubbing with his mates.

In all honesty, Louis isn’t sure how he fell for that one because Niall is eating all his food and Liam looks like he’s about to murder someone and really, how this is better than getting drunk is quite baffling.

“So what? You are such a self-centered asshole Louis. Maybe he just wanted to hang out with you when you weren’t busy pouring coffee! Maybe he just wanted to be nice and instead he got you acting like an asshole!” Liam shouts and it stuns Louis and Niall into silence because this is Liam Payne. Liam Payne does not shout. Liam Payne simmers in anger and mutters curse words when he thinks nobody can hear him.

Louis doesn’t mean to shout back. He doesn’t because Liam is his friend—his best friend—and if he’s upset enough to shout than Louis must have done something really bad but god, how is that fair? He’s the one getting pranked by unnaturally hot college students.

“Jesus Liam, why do you care? It’s my fucking life.”

Liam stares at him like Louis is the dirtiest, most disgusting cockroach he’s ever seen and just the sight of Louis horrible existence makes him want to throw up. He grabs his jacket and car keys and leaves without saying anything else, banging the door with all his strength on his way out.

“You see mate, the thing is: Liam doesn’t have a heart either," Niall adds in his nonchalant way before he gets up and starts looking for his stuff. It takes Louis a while to understand what Niall means, and when he does his Irish friend is already patting him on the shoulder and leaving.

He waits five very long minutes to call Liam. Five minutes, in which he carefully constructs a meaningful apology letter, where he claims all his faults and all of Liam’s qualities and begs his best friend for forgiveness. It’s a very nice speech, Louis is almost hundred percent sure it’s gonna make Liam tear up a bit. And then Liam picks up the phone and everything goes out the window.

“I’m sorry for being an asshole. I really, really am.”

“It’s alright. I’m sorry for yelling at you.”

And that’s it. That’s the whole apology. From the other side of the line Louis can practically hear Liam smiling that stupid ‘I poop rainbows’ smile of his and it makes him smile too.

“You still nearby?”

Liam chuckles and before he can reply he hears an Irish voice shouting into the phone. “We never even left the building, now open the door. I was watching the game.”

The thing about Liam and Niall is that Louis has known them for a long time. He’s been best friends with Liam since they were both kids and one day Louis decided shoving a bucketful of sand in Liam’s trousers was the best idea ever. It wasn’t. It got him two weeks detention and his mom forced him to apologize to Liam, who was actually a really nice kid and too defenseless for his own good so Louis took it to himself to protect him forever.

Louis hadn’t been there when it most mattered though. When Liam most needed him, Louis hadn’t been there. But they’re over that now, because Liam wasn’t there for Louis either and there’s no point crying over spilled milk.

He met Niall on his first week working in the coffee shop. It was pouring outside, literally just raining buckets and buckets of water and Louis was thinking of closing early since nobody was brave enough to leave their homes in such shitty weather. Nobody except a blonde Irish, straight out of the airport who was lost and drenched and had nowhere to go and was still more cheerful than a handful of gerbils.

It didn’t take long for Niall to tell Louis his life story—two point three minutes actually—and then even though Louis neither cared nor did he want more people in his life, he still listened. Niall was going to be studying at the music college, he had a half scholarship which meant he needed to rent the cheapest place he could find and even though he’d known he was coming for months, he still hadn’t bothered to check for a place to stay. Lucky for him, a certain Liam Payne had just lost a roommate and was looking for a new companion.

It officially took Niall less than five minutes to enter Louis’ life and three years down the road, he’s still showing no signs of leaving. Not that Louis was complaining. He likes Niall. Mostly because Niall is weird and so relaxed about everything, it’s ridiculous.

“You’re going to fix things right?” Liam asks halfway through the match and neither he nor Louis are paying any attention, mostly just watching the game mindlessly and enjoy the comfort that they’re not alone.

Instinctively Louis says, “huh?” even though he already knows what Liam’s talking about.

“You’re going to apologize to Harry, right?” Liam asks with his big, puppy eyes back in the game and Louis does not want to apologize to Harry because he’s still quite certain he was being mocked, but the truth is he doesn’t know and more often than not, Liam does.

“Yeah, I am.”

* * *

The next day, whenever someone enters the coffee shop, Louis’ head snaps to the door in the hopes that it’s Harry. Not that he’s hopeful for anything reason but apologize for being a dick and then make Harry apologize for being a dick too. Afterwards they would both go their separate ways, Harry to become a famous musician with his crazy hair and his stupid smile, and Louis to do nothing new whatsoever and die alone.

He gives up on the snapping his head thing around four p.m. because his neck is beginning to hurt and Harry is showing absolutely no signs of showing up. By the end of Louis’ shift Harry is nowhere to be found and Louis wonders if he’s messed things up for good.

* * *

Louis doesn’t work on Sundays, but he still stops by the coffee shop to see if Harry’s there.

He isn’t and El gives him a kiss on the cheek and free muffin instead and Louis has no idea why. He’s not sad not sad because he messed up something that wasn’t even real. That would be just stupid.

He’s only a bit sad because he’s starting to wonder if, not for the first time, he’s got it all wrong again.

* * *

On Monday Louis doesn’t have much hope of ever seeing Harry again. He’s being a ‘dramatic queen’ again according to Liam, but in all honesty Louis thinks he’s a dramatic queen all the time. He can’t help it. It’s who he is. If he had a heart he’d probably be in gay parades everyday being flamboyant and loud about everything.

He’s so busy serving a couple of giggling their cappuccinos’ with extra milk and almost no coffee that he doesn’t even notice Harry until the curly haired wonder is standing right in front of him, blushing from the tip of ears all the way down to his neck. He looks rather sheepish, which Louis doesn’t understand because according to the conversations he’s had with Liam and Niall over the weekend and from the mental playbacks Louis has been doing form their last conversation, if anyone should be feeling sheepish and embarrassed, it should be him.

“I’m sorry,” Harry begins apologizing before Louis even has the chance to let out his standard ‘hi what can I get you?’.

“I didn’t mean to come here, I know you hate me but this is the closest place to my apartment—“

“I don’t hate you," The words slip out of his mouth too quickly for Louis’ brain to catch on with the proceedings.

“You don’t?”

“No.”

“Oh. Well, that’s good," Harry nods his head like he’s trying to digest the fact that Louis doesn’t hate him, and then before Louis can begin stumbling on with his pre-made apology—because he might have given up on seeing Harry ever again but he didn’t give up on fixing things—Harry is declaring he wants a mocha coffee and a chocolate chip cookie, shoving a ten dollar bill in Louis’ hand and running away to the farthest table in the room.

Louis takes as long as he can making Harrys’ coffee since he has no idea what just happened and he’d very much like to figure it out before he goes up to Harry and tries to fix things.

In the end, he reaches no decent conclusions, which is probably for the best since everything seems to go to hell whenever Louis reaches any sort of conclusion.

“I’m sorry for freaking out on you last week, it was stupid," Louis says, making spectacular good use of his incredibly diversified vocabulary.

Harry smiles at him, although his smile is constricted and almost a bit painful, nothing like the ones he used to give Louis and then words are spewing out of Louis’ mouth, words that can fix things, words that can make Harry smile brightly again because if there’s one thing Louis has grown really fond of, it’s Harry’s smile.

“If that dinner proposal is still on, I’d love to go, but like, I know you probably don’t want to now, I mean, I’m just saying that if you do…”

“Really? You aren’t going to run away again?” It’s supposed to come out as a joke but the way Harry’s smile still isn’t reaching his eyes makes the words fall flat between them.

“I won’t. I’m really sorry for last week.”

Harry nods, apparently satisfied with Louis’ honesty. “We’ll go after your shift then.”

After he’s reached the counter, Louis stops and asks himself what he’s doing. It’s a question he asks himself many times whenever he’s doing something particularly stupid or when he temporarily pretends he has a heart. Often, both things happen at the same time and this occasion is no exception.

He doesn’t have a heart and he just agreed to go on a date.

There must be something wrong with his brain, because Louis didn’t know anyone as ridiculous as him. The original plan had been to talk to Harry, fix whatever awkward thing they’d created and then pretend they didn’t know each other.

And now he’s going on a date.

It’s amazing how life takes twists and turns so quickly.

As expected, Louis is silently freaking out, wondering if he can call Liam and demand he do something—anything—and make things right again. And then Harry looks up from underneath the mop he calls ‘haircut’ and he smiles at Louis a genuine, real smile, which is brighter than the flashiest star and Louis has no idea what he’s doing, but maybe he can do it anyway.

* * *

It’s a lovely date. As far as dates go, Louis has never had better. Admittedly, he hasn’t been on a date since he lost his heart and the ones he went on were before were… Well, they weren’t very real to begin with. They were too nice, too perfect, too sweet; too much. It’s kind of a wonder how Louis didn’t see it, how he was as blind as a bat and fell for the oldest trick in the book. But that’s all in the past now.

The restaurant Harry takes him too is as great as Harry plays it out to be in their short walk there. Even though it’s incredibly near his house, Louis has never been there, didn’t even know the tiny red door encrusted in the red brick wall had a purpose. Harry already sort of knows everyone, smiles at the waiters and greets a couple of patrons with firm handshakes and Louis wonders if he brings all his dates there.

He then tells himself to stop thinking like the teenage girl he secretly is, and focus on the fact that he’s on a date, an actual fucking date and it’s a mystery how he hasn’t texted Niall asking him to rescue him yet.

Back in the coffee shop, Louis had decided to follow through with the date idea not because of Harry’s smile, although that definitely had some weight in, but because he is curious about whatever game Harry is playing at. Louis is by nature a curious person, he likes to find the whys and the whats and the hows, and not so much by nature but by a really unfortunate event, he’s also incredibly cynical and is more than one hundred percent sure there is some kind of game on.

They talk about Louis’ job (Louis tells Harry it’s simple and quick and Harry asks him with wide eyes if he has any sort of dream job because working in a coffee shop is not what most people dream about in life and Louis just shrugs because he gave up on dreams a long time ago), Harry’s college life (he’s studying music theory, aspiring music artist; plays the guitar and the piano and sings and even though Louis hasn’t heard him yet, he can already imagine he’s more than brilliant), the weather (foggy and rainy and Louis jokes about not remembering what a day full of sunlight is like and Harry laughs too much), their favorite football teams (Manchester for both of them and Louis can’t help thinking Harry just got a thousand times better) and whatever else they can think of (movies they’ve seen recently, favorite food, hobbies).

Harry doesn’t ask about the black hole in Louis’ chest where a heart once stood, something not very surprising considering Harry seems to be the boy every mother wants her little girl to marry and when the night ends, Louis is more confused than ever.

Harry walks him home and Louis wonders if by any chance they travelled to a cliché, summer movie with a not at all epic romance and why nobody sent him the memo.

“I had a really lovely time,” Louis says because he’s hopeless and he’s watched The Princess Diaries with his little sisters too many times for his poor brain to handle properly.

“Me too,” Harry replies, voice dropping lower and graver and then he’s leaning in and Louis is not leaning back.

They kiss. It’s this tiny peck on the lips and if Louis had a heart it would be beating like a horse on adrenaline at this point. Harry smiles, of course he does, and then he’s walking backwards, waving only slightly awkwardly as he abandons Louis on his front steps.

After stumbling into his apartment and making himself a cup of tea, Louis throws an old coin in the air to make sure he wasn’t ‘inceptioned’ when he wasn’t looking. When he’s sure he’s in the right world, he calls Liam and Niall and tells them to come over.

Since he was a teenager, Louis has stood by his righteous anger against the world and let the blind dislike for all human beings lead him through life. Right now, he feels like all of his anger as deserted him and just the thought of standing up makes him feel nauseated.

It’s like someone came in the middle of the night and took away everything Louis believed in, leaving him numb and purposeless. Louis is not his beliefs, he’s not just a guy without a heart who lives life simply because he’s forced to and doesn’t care about anything or anyone. Or at least, he used to fool himself into believing he wasn’t because that certain someone happened to have a great sense of style, an amazing smile and ridiculous hair and Louis doesn’t think they’re playing a game anymore.

* * *

“Can you please, for the tiniest moment, consider the possibility that he likes you and doesn’t care that you don’t have a heart?” Liam pleads, but even Louis can tell he doesn’t really believe what he’s saying since they both know it’s bullshit.

“Harry’s nice Liam, but he’s not that nice," The words ‘no one with half a brain is’ remain unspoken but painfully loud between them.

They fall into an awkward silence then, broken only be the sound of Niall eating his chips.

“Maybe he doesn’t know you don’t have a heart,” Niall says as easily as one might say ‘pass the remote mate.’ Louis gapes at him and Liam lifts a single - manicured - eyebrow. They always knew Niall’s a bit off, but this is just a whole new level of offness.

It’s true that there are no physical differences between people who have hearts and people who don’t, but it’s also true that there’s no need to be a difference to be able to tell them apart. Even though there are no huge black holes in their chest, no black eyes, no faces devoid of emotion and no blood trailing down their mouths, there is something.

You can sense when someone doesn’t have a heart. Those people are darker, they look like they live in the shadows and they just seem more hollow without actually showing any signs of having an empty space in their bodies. Louis thinks of it as having a crude, black ‘X’ carved on his chest that is constantly shouting ‘heartless’ directly into people’s minds. There’s no literal shouting, but the word is still there, flashing in front of people’s eyes when they see Louis.

“I’ve heard some stories,” Niall adds before the others decide to throw him into the loony bin, “people who are so caught up in their own little world that they don’t even notice the people around them. Usually it’s common on people with disorders and shit who begin thinking the world is made of candy and everyone is a robot. Maybe your Harry has that, only instead of thinking rivers are made of beer, he thinks everyone has a heart.”

When he finishes speaking, Niall does his usual ‘what-I-just-said-was-probably-really-smart-but-I-don’t-care-because-I’m-too-cool-for-school’ shrug.

Louis takes a moment to process Niall’s words. He doesn’t think Harry’s crazy, in fact, Harry is probably one of the sanest persons he knows, if not for the smiling too much and drinking enough coffee to kill an elephant everyday. On any other day, Louis would probably be able to make his own opinion on Niall’s words, but currently his brain is still feeling a bit fried from earlier so he decides to wait for Liam’s verdict instead.

“I don’t think Harry’s crazy," Ah! Louis knew he was right on that one. “If you want I could try talking to him. You say he always shows up in the mornings right? Well, tomorrow you could trade shifts with El and I can use the opportunity to talk to him while you’re not there giving him googly eyes," Louis feels the need to point out that he and Harry certainly do not eye-fuck, not graphically anyway, but refrains from doing it because it would just probably go unheard and Liam’s plan sounds interesting.

“And you just what? Go up to him and ask him if he can see hearts?”

“Yeah?”

Louis is sure there’s something wrong with Liam’s plan. He’s almost ninety-nine percent certain he should be making some kind of objection because the idea of Liam and Harry in the same room is so unnatural, it almost makes his body flush in embarrassment.

It’s quite late though, and Louis is exhausted and sleepy and he can still taste the red wine Harry had drank on his lips so really, what’s the worst that can happen?

* * *

Liam thinks of himself as a good friend in the way that most people think of themselves as generous because they gave a homeless person a penny or good swimmers because they took swimming lessons when they were five.

He thinks of himself as a good friend because he’s known Louis since they were both tiny brats and he’s - almost - always been there for him.

He doesn’t think a lot about the implications of being a good friend except for how they include watching too much television to be healthy while drinking cheap beer, offering bad advice and doing things one would not naturally do.

Things like procrastinating work and going to coffee shops at nine a.m. in the search of someone who meets the description of a ‘curly haired wonder with a fucking fantastic sense of style and a smile that literally - like seriously Liam, I mean it a smile that literally blinds people.

In Liam’s shopping for list for Christmas the words ‘dictionary for Louis’ are already present.

Liam is about to go up to the counter and ask Eleanor if she knows who Harry is because he hasn’t seen any curly-haired wonder yet and the article about flying chicken spotted in Bradford isn’t going to write itself when somebody taps him on the shoulder.

“Hello, are you Louis?” Asks the boy, who has dark skin, vertical hair and the most amazing eyes Liam’s ever.

“No, I’m Liam, his friend. You’re not Harry, are you?” The boy in front of his as a pointed lack of curls, but he’s bloody gorgeous and Liam wouldn’t be surprised if his beauty somehow made Louis go delusional.

Vertical hair boy smiles and suddenly Liam doesn’t think that thing about turning people blind is bollocks anymore. This thought completely disappears when the boy speaks. “No, I’m Harry’s friend, Zayn.”

And thank god for that one because Liam would hate to tell Louis they were now crushing on the same person.

* * *

“So, why are you here?” Everybody should take note that Liam is not, never was and never will be, the king of subtlety. Subtlety is just one of those things that skipped Liam upon birth. If subtlety was a person, he would have looked at Liam and said ‘lol no’.

Zayn chuckles, looking at Liam in a manner that was positively indecent through his eyelashes as he replies. “Harry has been going on and on about the hot guy in the coffee show who made the best coffee in the world, so I got curious and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. You?”

“Sort of the same," Liam replies awkwardly, wishing for what had to be the hundredth time that he knew how to lie with conviction to people.

As expected, Zayn picks up on his existence. “Sort of?”

There are many ways Liam can go on about this, ways that are not rudely blunt and recklessly stupid. Ways that are—honestly—too much of a bother for Liam to consider them.  “Does Harry know Louis doesn’t have a heart?”

Zayn seems momentarily taken aback by Liam’s honesty, but quickly regains his footing as he plasters an easy smirk on his face. “Yeah, Harry doesn’t care about that," Zayn points his index finger to himself and moves it up and down a bit to prove his point, and it takes Liam thirty-six seconds to understand what the little movement means.

It’s not that Liam’s usually slow on the uptake. It’s just that you really wouldn’t see it unless you were looking for it. Zayn doesn’t have a heart.

the only thing Liam manages to say is a murmured “oh,” as his brain tries to reconcile everything he’s always know about not having a heart - that it’s noticeable, permanent, a sigh of failure, a mark of weakness - and the fact that the boy in front him looks every bit as normal as everybody with a heart, unlike Liam and Louis, who walk with constant reminders of who they are rudely marked on their bodies.

Zayn chuckles for the second time since they’ve started talking, apparently amused by Liam’s confusion. “My mom always told me, people only notice what they’re supposed to notice. Personally, I don’t like them noticing I’m different, so I don’t show it.”

“But—how?”

“It’s a confidence thing. It’s about believing," Zayn shrugs and Liam understands he’s not going to get a straight answer from Zayn, which is fine by Liam because at this point he thinks he already has enough confusion to last him a lifetime.

They sit in an awkward silence for a couple of minutes as Liam tries to find something to say. Even though Liam already has the answers he’d been looking for, he doesn’t want to let go of Zayn just yet because well, Zayn’s hot, like really hot, and he’s also sort of smart and mysterious and Liam’s only known him for five minutes but he’s quickly becoming aware that he wants to know Zayn for the rest of his life.

“So Harry, he doesn’t care?” It’s the best Liam can come up with.

“His mom doesn’t have a heart. His dad does. They pretty much taught him all you need to be with someone is determination and enough desire and strength to do it.”

“Are they happy?” Liam asks, hoping he’s not pushing it too much, but Zayn only smiles fondly, like he’s remembering an old memory that is too good to be true.

“Yeah, they are.”

Liam nods. He’s heard stories about couples where one had a heart and one didn’t, of course he has (and maybe he’s dreamt about that a couple of times, maybe he hasn’t), but hearing a real story about one that seems to be happy is always different, always makes him feel a bit better with himself.

The conversation steers into safer topics after that. Mostly it’s Zayn coming up with ridiculous questions about Liam (‘what’s your favorite power ranger? did you sleep with a teddy bear when you were a kid? Backstreet Boys or N*SYNC?’) and the best part is how he looks like he’s genuinely interested, smiling brightly whenever one of his questions erupts a giggle out of Liam.

“So, how did you lose your heart?” Zayn asks after he comes back from the counter with a blueberry muffin (for Liam) and a chocolate muffin (for himself). Liam is only slightly taken back by the abrupt question, regaining his composure quickly when he remembers that this is Zayn asking him, not some random stranger on the street.

Usually when people ask Liam how he lost his heart… well, they’re curious about it obviously, but there’s always this malicious tone behind their voices. Something that whispers ‘how did you screw up your life?’ All that Liam sees coming from Zayn is genuine curiosity and sympathy.

“Gave it away to this boy when I was fifteen. Thought he was the love of my life; you know, the usual," Liam can’t help letting out a depreciative chuckle and Zayn’s smile is only a tad bit humorless.

“Same. Guess that’s always the story, right?” Zayn’s question is rhetorical, but it makes Liam cringe all the same because no, not really. Unfortunately some people had it worse.

“What?” Zayn asks when he realizes he’s hit a weak spot.

“Louis’ heart was stolen. He was tricked by an ‘addict’.”

Zayn whistles as his eyebrows shoot up, but his face quickly takes a somber expression as both boys stare at the table.

An ‘addict’ is the worst kind of human being there is, in Liam’s opinion. It’s someone who devotes their lives to stealing hearts, to tricking people into loving them and offering them their most precious possession. Most of the time the ‘addict’ will consume the heart immediately, enamored by it, although Liam’s heard stories about people who keep them and sell them later for absurd prices in the black market.

The worst part about the practice is that it’s not illegal. It should be, and there are many people who believe in this, people with or without hearts, but the truth is it’s almost impossible to determine if someone ate a heart on purpose or by accident. Some people get their hearts eaten by ‘addicts’ and they never even know it, think that it was just a teenage crush gone wrong and that the other party’s sudden disappearance is because they feel so bad for what they’ve done, they can’t even stand the sight of their lost loved ones anymore.

It’s disgusting and just thinking about it – just thinking of what happened to Louis makes Liam want to curl up into a ball and roll off a cliff.

This is ridiculous because if anything, Liam should be strong and supportive for his best friend, but he can’t help it. He can’t help feeling completely hopeless as he looks back at the summer when Louis returned from summer camp a whole new person. He’d been broken, shattered into a thousand pieces and most of all, he’d been too embarrassed, refusing to let anyone in.

It took Liam’s own ‘accident’ for them to talk again, bonding over the fact that they were now both social outcasts in their small town, whether they liked it or not.

Next year Louis finished high school and moved to London. Liam followed a year afterwards, and even though they didn’t’ share an apartment because by Liam’s own words ‘I love you Lou, but you’re worse than a pig mate’ they still remained as close as ever.

“So, do you like football?” Zayn asks as he tries to steer their conversation into safer waters. He gets a bright smile from Liam in return, who belatedly realizes that Zayn is without a doubt, nothing short of amazing.

* * *

“So?” The enquiry starts as soon as Liam enters Louis’ apartment.

Louis and Niall are already slumped on the couch, microwave meals in their laps as they watch Doctor Who. Liam drops his messenger bag on the floor and moves to the kitchen where, if he’s lucky, Niall’s left him some food for dinner.

“Harry wasn’t there.”

“He wasn’t?” Louis asks, voice raising a tiny octave. When he’d gotten to the cafe for his afternoon shift, neither Liam or Harry were around, so Louis had just concluded they’d gone off before his arrival, maybe to gossip about him and paint each other’s toenails.

“Nope,” Liam says as he shoves Niall and Louis to the side with his whole body to make room for himself, “but his friend Zayn was," And if Liam’s voice takes a dreamy tone when mentioning Zayn, well hardly anyone could blame him once they met Zayn.

“Zayn? Who’s Zayn?”

“Harry’s friend. He was there to check you out since apparently Harry can’t stop talking about you.”

“Oh, he can’t?” If what’s on Louis’ face isn’t a blush then Liam is secretly Santa Claus.

“Yeah, Zayn also said that Harry knows you don’t have a heart, he just doesn’t care. Zayn doesn’t have a heart either and he and Harry are still best friends.”

“He’s like me then," Neither Louis nor Liam added that Niall isn’t like Harry, at least not until he tries dating someone heartless.

“Zayn said Harry’s mom doesn’t have a heart, but his dad does and according to Zayn, they’re happy.”

Something in Liam’s voice irks Louis, who lets out a tiny bite. “Jesus Liam, if I didn’t know any better I’d say you have a crush on this Zayn guy. It’s Zayn said this and Zayn did that.”

Liam very purposely keeps quiet as his cheeks began to flame red. Slowly, painfully, excruciatingly slowly Louis and Niall turn their heads to him. “Oh no you didn’t—” Niall begins to say as the inner black woman in him gets ahold of his mouth.

“Liam!” Louis shouts as he throws his hands into the air dramatically.

“What?”

“You said it yourself, he doesn’t have a heart so please, for the love of god, tell me you didn’t just fall for him.”

“I—no, I mean, well—“

“Liam!” Louis shouts again, slightly more hysteric than last time as Liam struggles to find some kind of excuse that will make his friends lay off him.

“So what if I did? He seemed interested in me! And he’s funny and good-looking and smart. And what do you have to do with who I do and don’t like? You’re always telling me to back off so don’t be a fucking hypocrite Louis.”

“Oh don’t you even—you and I both know that’s different.”

“Different? Different how? You like Harry, who not only has a heart and can offer you a chance at happiness but also likes you. I like Zayn, who doesn’t have a heart but is still really, really amazing."

“You barely even know him! You met him today.”

“So?”

Louis grunts, pulling himself roughly to his feet. “This is ridiculous, you and Zayn and Harry, you’re all fucking ridiculous and hell if I’m going to get dragged into your fantasies," And with those words Louis is grabbing his jacket and out the door, desperate for some space and fresh air.

He goes for a walk at the nearest park, which is nearly deserted since it’s already nighttime. Only some couples making out on wooden benches remain, alongside with teenagers—attacking? Running after? Collecting?—pigeons.

The walk only serves to dampen Louis’ mood. It’s like the more he walks, the more people stare at him, the more he feels depressed and the more Louis wants to walk and mindlessly kick pebbles. This process kind of repeats itself over and over again until Louis feels like all eyes are on him, judging him and silently whispering things about him behind his back.

When he’s returning home, Louis passes by a couple with two kids. The youngest seems to be asleep on the arms of his dad, who carries him like he’s the most precious thing on Earth. The oldest, a tiny blonde girl, is walking hand in hand with her mom and she stares at Louis when passing him, all big eyes and young innocence, full of curiosity and without an inch of judgment. Her mom, when seeing her daughter look at Louis, pulls her closer to her and whispers something Louis doesn’t catch, but is sure it’s something along the lines of “Don’t look at those people honey, they’re dangerous.”

The crude ‘X’ on his chest telling the world who Louis is suddenly feels heavier, blacker, more real. His feet turn to lead, his head feels too heavy for his shoulders and Louis wishes, more than ever, that he could change the past because he doesn’t deserve this, he really doesn’t.

When he returns to his miniature apartment, Niall and Liam have long since gone, alongside with all of Louis’ beer and chips. On his coffee table there’s a yellow post-it with a small message, scribbled hastily in Niall’s handwriting.

‘u need to have more faith in ppl xx’

Not for the first time, Louis goes to bed wondering why bad things happen to good people.

* * *

It takes Louis twenty seven minutes to get out of bed the next day; he’s dreading with every fiber of his body, going to the café where he’s certain Harry is going to be at. His brain keeps telling him to run, run Forest run, like the wind into the mountains where he’ll never have to meet another human being again! His brain is also telling him that there are bears in the mountains and sooner or later, he’s going to have to confront Harry, so he might as well make it sooner and get it over with.

He dresses without any hurry, eats at snail pace and walks so slowly an obese guy in one of those weird motorcycling scooters manages to overpass him. Not that Louis cares; he’s walking with his head hung low, feeling depressed and miserable about everything in his life.

During the night he’d reached the conclusion that finishing things with Harry is the best solution, that letting Liam realize he’s making a terrible mistake by falling for Zayn is probably the best he can do. Basically Louis has decided to shun out his best friend and the guy who lights up his whole day with just a smile because he knows he is doing the right thing.

Still, it doesn’t mean Louis has to be happy about it.

Because he isn’t, he really, really isn’t and just the thought of hurting Harry makes him feel sick, but his decision is for the best of all of them. Harry’s a lovely guy and Louis is sure he’s going to find someone perfect for him, with a heart and a real job and a future, and they’re both going to live happily ever after.

When Louis arrives at the café Harry is already there as expected, his brilliant smile only diminishing when he sees the somber look on Louis’ face. He gets up and makes his way towards Louis, who hasn’t entered the café yet, is simply standing by the doorway awkwardly as he waits for Harry to approach him.

“We can’t do this," Is the first thing Louis says when Harry is within earshot.

“What? What do you mean Louis? I thought you’d had a great time…”

“I did, but I just—I can’t do this Harry. You have a heart, and you deserve someone much better than me. I’m sorry but this is not going to work out," Louis starts walking towards the counter as soon as the words are out of his mouth.

Harry’s about to grab his arm and demand more explanations, especially explanations that make sense, but one look at Louis’ face, which is the perfect portrait of broken anguish, stops him.

He doesn’t look like he wants to let Louis go, but he’s not about to force the other man to stay and talk to him if doing so seems to physically hurt him.

Louis doesn’t know whether to be relieved that Harry is not going to insist, or sad that Harry gave up so easily because even though he knows he’s making the best call, a part of him still wants to be wrong, desperately and irrevocably wrong.

Because Louis only saw a tiny screenshot of what Harry is like but already, he’s thoroughly inspired by the amazing human being he seems to be. He only knows a couple of things about Harry and even though, by all means of logic and reason, he shouldn’t be impressed or amazed, he is. And Louis wishes that he could see more, wishes for the chance of knowing Harry better, wishes that he didn’t have to give up before things ever started.

But he’s walking away, Harry isn’t stopping him and it’s too late.

It’s always too late for him.

* * *

The next two days are possibly the worst in Louis’ life.

Harry stills shows up on Thursday and Friday, giving Louis the saddest, most miserable and extremely pathetic puppy eyes on the face of the Earth from his new table at the back. Despite looking like he’s favorite pet has been run over, he never dares to approach Louis.

The silent staring makes Louis feel like an honest-to-god piece of shit. He never meant to hurt Harry, but what else was he supposed to do? They couldn’t be together, they just couldn’t.

On Saturday Harry doesn’t show up, and Louis concludes he’s given up. He can’t help giving a sigh of relief at that thought even though a part of him still wishes things were different. Somehow without Harry time seems to go slower, almost like it’s given up on Louis and it makes every second feel like an eternity.

Louis loves his job because it’s quick, everything is always permanently quick and now he feels like he’s frozen, with every minute stretched until it has reached its breaking point. It’s traumatizing and in all honesty, Louis has no idea how to deal with it. Normally he’d just go to Liam and ask for his advice, but he and Liam aren’t exactly on friendly speaking terms at the moment since Louis is still waiting for Liam’s fallout. Going to Niall would be as helpful as going to a rock, since the Irish would probably just say something incredibly meaningful and useless about karma.

Sunday is spent feeling sorry himself and eating all the ice cream his body can handle before it decides to give up and throw everything out the way it came in. Niall sends him a couple of texts asking if he wants to watch some TV, telling him that he can come over if he wants but Louis just tells him he’s not in the mood, which he really isn’t, and continues his marathon of self-pity thoughts.

It’s funny how doing the right thing, something supposed to make his and everybody else’s lives better, hurts like a bitch.

Harry doesn’t show up on Monday, and he doesn’t show up on Tuesday or Wednesday and Thursday or Friday either, and by the next Saturday Louis is completely certain he’s already been forgotten. Everything about his job still makes him feel miserable and like time’s slowed down considerably and Louis begins to consider getting a new job, only to mentally slap himself immediately after the thought occurs to him.

This is the best job someone like him can get. He’s not about to give it up just because a dumb boy, who for some weird reason cared about Louis, practically turned his whole world upside down. That would not only be incredibly stupid, but it would also elevate Louis’ pathetic level by a hundred, and honestly, Louis’ pathetic level is already big enough as it is.

The café is, as usual, vaguely empty for most of the day and by the time Louis starts closing the shop, thirty minutes before his shift actually ends, there’s no one around. So when someone enters through the tiny wooden frame, Louis is more than prepared to smile politely and tell them to go away because frankly, he’s tired and he doesn’t give a shit that what he’s doing can get him fired since there’s nobody around to know.

What he isn’t prepared for is for the boy to marching straight to him and punching him in the face.

“Oi, what the fuck?” Louis manages to gasp out as blood begins to spill from his nose.

“You’re a fucking asshole, you know that right? Harry is an amazing guy, and you’re lucky to even dream of having him and then you go and dump him because of some stupid, imaginary confidence problems you have? I’m sorry, but that’s just pathetic.”

Louis tries to intervene and say his confidence problems are not imaginary, they’re very real and scary, thank you very much, but the boy, who has the biggest quiff Louis’ ever seen and looks vaguely familiar for a reason Louis can’t quite tell, seems to be on a roll.

“Do you know what Harry did this week? Nothing. He ignored university completely and spent the whole fucking week moping around the house and moaning about you, a bastard who doesn’t even deserve him if you ask me. Just—fix this, alright? Stop looking at your belly button for one second and fucking fix this.”

And with those words the boy is out the door, storming out as quickly as he’d stormed in and leaving Louis with a bleeding nose and newfound headache.

* * *

“I punched Louis in the face,” are the first words out of Zayn’s mouth after Liam opens the door to his apartment and lets him in.

Liam takes a moment to look at Zayn, who doesn’t look like he got punched back and quietly nods. Louis might be his best friend, but he’s still a dick and a good punch in the face once in a while never hurt anyone.

“Did you hurt your hand?” Liam asks and Zayn seems momentarily surprised by the fact that Liam doesn’t give a shit that he punched Louis. “Louis deserved it," Liam adds with a simple shrug and Zayn quietly accepts this, after all, Liam’s the responsible one and if he thinks Louis deserved the punch than Zayn has nothing to feel bad about.

“So, your hand, did you hurt it?” Liam steps closer to Zayn and grabs his right hand lightly, tracing the knuckles with the pads of his fingers in the search for bruises.

“They’re a bit bruised,” Zayn says in a low voice, Liam’s breath ghosting in on his lips since they’re practically glued to each other now, and when that happened neither really knows, “nothing much.”

Liam nods once again and something in the kitchen beeps, breaking the moment.

“Er, I was making some tea, do you want some?”

“That would be nice, yeah,” And then Liam is heading for the kitchen and abandoning Zayn, who plants himself on the living room’s couch.

He’s only been in Liam’s house once, on Tuesday night to watch the new episode of Hell’s Kitchen because apparently Liam’s housemate, Niall, is really into the show and Liam wanted some normal company that didn’t shout as much as Ramsay. Zayn had a feeling Liam was bullshitting him, since he knew for a fact Ramsay didn’t know how to talk without shouting, but had accepted the invitation with no hesitance because it was Liam and he’d probably watch High School Musical for Liam.

Ten minutes into the show  there was a bowl of popcorn on the floor, popcorn in Zayn’s hair, Liam half grimacing, half laughing at the situation and Niall shouting like he’d just been stabbed by a gigantic squirrel who had also taken the chance to steal all of his life’s savings.

Still, Zayn can’t deny that it had been a fun night and thanks to it he’s now a bit more comfortable in Liam’s apartment, even confident enough to leave his jacket on one of the armchairs and laze back on the couch with his eyes closed.

Liam puts a warm tea mug in front of his face when he returns, smiling shyly when Zayn takes it from him and their fingers linger for a bit too long.

They drink their tea in quiet company, gradually leaning towards each other in the silence and comfort of Liam’s empty house.

“How’s Harry?” Liam asks.

“Shitty,” Zayn says and Liam only hums in agreement. He hasn’t seen Harry yet, but Zayn’s told him enough through texts and late night calls to know Harry isn’t doing very well, and knowing Louis, he’s probably the same. “Do you think Louis will talk to him?”

“Did you ask him to talk to Harry?”

“Yeah," Liam takes a moment to consider Zayn’s words, wonders how much Zayn actually said and confronts it with what he knows about Louis, which is an awful lot but still not enough because Louis is not predictable in the slightest. One minute he might be moaning about wanting a nacho, the next he’s prank calling McDonalds, throwing water balloons through his window and forcing Niall into making him Mexican food.

“I don’t think so. He’s too stubborn, probably thinks he’s doing the right thing by being a miserable tosser.”

“Then I’ll talk to Harry, get him to move. Anything to get them to see the light of reason and get their heads out of their asses," Liam laughs at Zayn’s words and Zayn can’t help laughing with him and then they’re just laughing, a bit too loudly and a bit too hysteric as they lean on each other and wonder when they became love counselors for two overly dramatic losers.

“Do you- do you think two people without hearts can be together?” Liam asks this very quietly when they’ve finished laughing, like he’s afraid of the being chastised for his question, or maybe he’s just afraid of the answer.

Zayn almost lets a ‘I don’t know’ slip out before he stops himself and really thinks about Liam’s question, plays back all the conversations he’s had with Harry about it, thinks of all the supposed facts the world knows about people without hearts. “There’s no such a thing as eternal," He finally says.

“Is that a yes?” They’re so close now, as close as they’d been before when Liam was checking Zayn’s hands, and Zayn thinks he can count Liam’s eyelashes if he tries hard enough and that Liam’s gorgeous, simply gorgeous. Liam thinks that Zayn’s the prettiest human being he’s ever met and he wonders what it would be like to date him, to wake up to Zayn’s sleeping face in the mornings, to call him his better half.

“Yes Liam, it's definitely a yes," Because Zayn still has his whole life ahead of him, and if he doesn’t believe he has a chance of being happy with someone as beautiful as Liam, then what does he believe in?

Liam’s the one to close the distance between them and their bodies melt into each other almost instantly, like they’re meant to fit together and Liam thinks if this is a dream, then he never wants to wake up from it.

* * *

In the end Zayn doesn’t have to talk to Harry.

He only returns to his shared apartment with the curly haired boy after a very lovely – if not slightly embarrassing night when Niall stormed into the house like an unstoppable Irish hurricane and saw some things that, in his own words, had ruined his purity and rotted his brain.

The pancakes Zayn and Liam made him for breakfast seemed to fix everything though, and when Zayn was leaving around noon Niall gave him a big hug and wished them the best of luck. He also told Zayn, while Liam was in the bathroom, that if he hurt Liam, Niall was going to beat the shit out of him, but he did it with a smile on his face so Zayn tried not to take it personally.

Friends were friends after all, and he had punched Louis just the previous day for the same reasons.

When Zayn enters his apartment, he’s mentally prepared to find Harry on the floor, most likely dry sobbing and eating ice cream out of the tube like a fat lard. He isn’t expecting Harry to be dressed in his best clothes, hair neatly groomed to the side and if he isn’t using makeup to disguise his baggy eyes than Zayn isn’t as gay as a rainbow.

“Zayn! Do you have the address to Louis’ house?” Harry loudly exclaims as soon as he sees his best friend.

“What?”

“His address Zayn, do you have it? You’re all buddy-buddy with his best friend right, so he probably has it, can you get it for me, pretty please?”

Zayn stares for some good five point seconds, temporarily considers asking Harry what the fuck he’s going on about, then realizes Harry is actually planning on taking matters into his own hands and talking to Louis. Either that or he’s planning on murdering him. For his own sake and mental health, Zayn goes with the first possibility.

A quick text to Liam gives him Louis’ address, which he quickly hands over to Harry, but not before asking. “But wait, didn’t you walk him home after your date and then kissed him on his front steps like the romantic teenager you are?”

Harry has the decency to blush as he answers. “I was sort of too busy looking at him and getting the nerve to kiss him to actually notice where we were going.”

Zayn nods. Letting other people guide him around sounds like normal Harry, and normal Harry doesn’t kill people and that knowledge is enough for Zayn.

“Oh but Harry, me and Liam aren’t really buddy-buddies anymore. I mean, we still are, we’re just more than that, yeah?”

The smile that erupts on Harry’s face is simply brilliant. “You are? Great for you mate," Harry hugs Zayn and when he leaves out the door, he leaves looking more determined than ever.

Zayn’s phone beeps almost immediately after Harry’s left.

> ‘did u tlk to him’ from **liam xxx**

A small smile breaks on Zayn’s face as he texts back ‘didn’t have to’.

* * *

When Louis opens the door on Sunday morning he’s in a foul mood. In all honesty, saying he’s in a foul mood is a bit of an understatement. Louis is in a terrible and incredibly shitty mood. He feels like the whole world is conspiring against him and bringing loads of misery into his already misery packed life.

He’s expecting Niall, apologizing for Liam’s friend’s actions because he knows Liam can be a sneaky bastard when he wants to and the chances of him apologizing are near to null. Louis is not, in anyway whatsoever, expecting Harry to storm into his apartment.

He’s much less expecting Harry to shove him against the nearest wall and kiss him with everything he’s got, but that’s what happens and Louis is too shocked to do anything but let Harry kiss him. Louis begins to reciprocate involuntarily, because let’s face it, he hasn’t felt this kind of human contact in a long, long time and Harry is a very good kisser, or maybe Louis is just terribly out of practice; either way the kiss is nice and it makes Louis’ insides twist and makes him question why he would ever want Harry to leave his life when Harry is wonderful and nice and hot and a really fucking good kisser.

And then Harry pushes him too much, kisses with a little too much strength, mashes their faces together in a supposed to be grand romantic gesture that fails miserably because Louis’ nose is bruised and that shit hurts. The pain also reminds Louis all over again on why they shouldn’t be doing this and why he stepped away in the first place.

With a little more force than necessary, Louis shoves Harry away. “Harry, we can’t—“

The world most have a thing about giving Louis the chance to talk because Harry is cutting into whatever Louis is supposed to say with the force of a steam train. “Yes, we can.”

“If Zayn and Liam can try to be happy against the world’s definition of ‘true love’ than so can we.”

“What? They’re together? But they can’t, that isn’t how things work.”

“Says who?”

“Says everybody.”

“That’s bullshit, and you and I both know it. Nobody knows anything; they’re just throwing wild guesses in the air and waiting for one of them to catch. Zayn and Liam can be happy, they can have everything everybody else has if they want to and so can we," Harry looks like he’s been practicing his speech, running the lines to himself in the bathroom mirror and he looks so sure of himself, so certain he’s right that Louis begins to question if he truly is.

“But why?” Louis sighs and looks down, almost too embarrassed by his own question but needing to ask it nonetheless. “Why me? There are way better people out there who deserve you," The way Louis talks, so tired, so dignified to a life without any love or happiness practically snaps something inside of Harry.

“Louis Tomlinson you are beautiful. You laugh at my jokes even though we both know they’re rubbish and yours are a thousand times better. You’re way smarter than you give yourself credit for and you make a mean mocha coffee. You are absolutely gorgeous, and it genuinely confuses me how you can’t see it because whenever I look at you, all I wanna do is kiss the air out of your lungs and keep you in my arms forever.”

Now imagine this: instead of Louis being the heartless, it’s the other way around and Harry’s the one without a heart. Only Louis’ heart is broken, it’s as black as coal and so strong, not even the mightiest hammer could break it. It’s impenetrable, this massive rock in Louis’ chest that is constantly weighing him down. While Harry’s lack of heart only makes him lighter and braver.

And every word that spews out of Harry’s mouth somehow manages to make a crack in Louis’ heart. Every word of pure adoration makes a dent, smashes it and discards a piece. Every word makes Louis’ dark heart smaller and weaker until Louis feels like he can’t take it anymore, feels this mix of confused and extremely baffled happiness, but happiness nonetheless and he doesn’t know how it’s like to feel that way, doesn’t understand why anyone would be so nice to him.

So he just stares and listens as Harry bares himself to him, tells him how much he cares about Louis even though he shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t. There are bags beneath Harry’s eyes, hidden but still there and he’s as tired as Louis, maybe more and Louis just wants it to end because he doesn’t want to hurt Harry. He never wanted that.

“And I’m not asking you to marry me, because you’ll probably get bored of me along the way or whatever, and I’m just—I’m just asking you, can we please try?”

His brain is screaming ‘NO’, yelling that this will only hurt him further, damage him even more. But Harry’s right there in front of him, baring himself to Louis’ scrutinizing eyes with an honesty that would make politicians cry.

Louis knows he doesn’t deserve Harry, but that doesn’t stop him from wanting this – whatever ‘this’ might be – as much as Harry.

For a just second, he turns his annoying brain off and lets his natural instincts take control, walks forwards until he and Harry are face to face again. They stare into each other’s eyes for too long, both searching for something and hoping that they’ll find it, and when Louis speaks his voice is barely above a whisper, too broken and tired from fighting something he desires.

“Yes.”

Harry’s smile is too wide, too toothy and too bright and Louis can’t help smiling back with the same amount of giddy happiness.

It’s a good thing that both of them had always liked the idea of going against most of the world.


End file.
